Dance instructor still going strong at 100

Bonnie Bolte, one of the famous June Taylor Dancers, is still kicking up her heels at 100.

By Andy FillmoreCorrespondent

Bonnie Bolte, one of the famous June Taylor Dancers, is still kicking up her heels at 100.

“I gave a tap dance lesson two weeks ago,” said Bolte at a birthday celebration held in her honor Monday morning at the city of Ocala’s Eighth Avenue Senior Center.

Bolte has instructed dance at the location for 23 years and continues to give lessons, according to volunteer Anne Woodall.

Bolte, accompanied by her son Alan Bolte, was surrounded by about 30 friends and members of her senior class dance troupes, the Dapper Tappers, Bonnie’s Belles and the Senior Strutters, which are based on level of experience.

“We call her the Energizer Bunny because she keeps going and going,” said Bolte’s neighbor, Bob Hauck, who attended the party.

Bolte, who was born Jan. 29, 1913, said she started swaying to the rhythm as an infant.

“My father was a musician and music teacher. His music created (my) movement,” she said.

Bolte was born Birmingham, Alabama, where her father went deaf for two years and credited a chiropractor for curing his hearing loss. After a series of moves, the family settled in Greenwich, Connecticut, where both of her parents entered the chiropractic profession.

One of their patients asked about dance lessons for his daughter and was told to bring her over to the family’s basement, where Bolte, then 20, a graduate of Barnard College who had “studied dance under Russian dancer Sonia Serova,” started giving lessons.

“I always wanted to be a ballerina,” Bolte said.

Alan Bolte, 69, a retired television writer and producer for several networks, including National Geographic and The Learning Channel, said his mother’s instructional work centered on “tap, modern dance and tumbling, and she taught ballroom dance in the (local) schools.”

“My mother taught about 10,000 students from 1933 to 1974,” he said.

He added that she “gave dance instructions to bandleader Tommy Dorsey’s wife.”

Bolte said she has enjoyed all the forms of dancing she has seen.

“I liked all the dances that came along, from the Lindy Hop to the Twist,” she said. “Some of the dancing today (on television) is more acrobatics with jumps and throws. I dance to steps.”

She credits her career and enthusiasm to her “wonderful marriage” to her husband Alan Bolte Sr., who died in 1994 at age 85.

“My dad, Alan Sr., was with Hearst publishing and a semi-professional actor. He was the (ethereal) voice in the cartoon which would beckon for Mighty Mouse,” Alan Bolte said.

“In the 1980s, my mom and dad retired and moved to West Palm Beach and by 1984 to Ocala. When my mother attended a dance session at the Senior Center and the tap dance instructor didn’t show up, she took over as a ‘temp.’ She’s been a temp for 23 years,” he said.

The center’s dance groups have performed shows, often in costumes designed by Bolte, at venues including the Paddock Mall, Oak Run, On Top of the World, Dunnellon’s Boomtown Days and special events such as trips to Jacksonville, Orlando and Tallahassee while Jeb Bush was governor, according to 19-year dance troupe member Arlene Tice, 72.

“We met Bob Dole while we were in Tallahassee,” Tice said.

“I love it,” said Dorothy Smith, 82, a 20-plus year member of Bonnie’s Belles. “We used to meet two to three times a week; now our troupe gets together once a week. Bonnie still choreographs our numbers.”

Beth Steen, 84, came to the birthday event ready to dance.

“I wore my tap shoes,” said Steen, a tapper and avid jitterbug dancer. She said she used to “fall to the floor and jump for my husband Jay to catch me” while bands like Glenn Miller and the Dorsey Brothers played.

“Beth still dances. In fact, she would jump over the back fence but our neighbors would complain,” said Jay Steen with a smile.

Beth Steen performed a few dance steps with Alan Bolte during the event.

Dapper Tappers member Sara O’Conner, 85, has been tapping with Bolte for 23 years.